She pulls her lengths round in front of her and pinches them between two fingers before you have asked a single question. Then comes the sentence, sometimes before hello: “not too short”. On coily hair, that sentence has already decided your method.
The culprit has a name: shrinkage. Wet coily hair is stretched hair, and it will not stay at that length. Everything that follows comes from this, including your choice of method and the moment the scissors come into the service.
Key point 1Shrinkage governs everything else
Shrinkage is the hair returning to its natural shape as soon as it loses the water or tension that was stretching it. On a coily texture, it accounts for a considerable share of the apparent length, and it is never evenly spread: two neighbouring strands with different density or porosity do not spring back in the same way. Cutting wet therefore means drawing a line on a head of hair that will no longer exist an hour later.
Many of my clients sit down with the same worry: that too much will be cut off. I have never found it unreasonable. That is why I only ever cut coily hair dry, never wet. In the Rituel Texture®, once the protective drying is finished. In the Rituel Définition®, once the curls are defined and dry.
Ghana Elin, founderIt also explains those tense endings to appointments where nobody is in the wrong. The hairdresser cut straight, saw it with their own eyes, and the client finds a layered shape in the mirror that she never asked for. The line simply distorted as it dried, strand by strand, without anything in the technique being at fault. On dry hair, every strand is already at its true length, and what you cut is exactly what your client takes home.
That leaves the most common case, where the hair has been washed before the service, which is the rule in a full routine. The cut then waits for the drying, and that drying is not a concession to heat: it is step 05 of the Rituel Texture®, The Styling Cream applied along the full length, then drying in small sections with a hairdryer, in bouncing movements and never lingering on one area. Without it, there is no workable hair to cut. The technique is detailed in our article on drying coily hair in the salon.
Key point 2Two methods, two states of the fibre
“Cutting dry” does not describe a method. Dry, yes, but in what state: stretched or defined? The answer depends entirely on how your client wears her hair, and at our house it calls for two distinct proprietary methods that we never mix.
The orange-segment cut, in the Rituel Texture®
This is for the client who rarely wears her hair loose: buns, braids, twists, protective styles, hair worn up day to day. The cut comes after protective drying, on stretched, dry hair that is sectioned and then worked with The Man Dol' Comb. It needs strong, moving heat in the drying beforehand, otherwise the hair is not stretched enough for the line to be readable. Step 06, Lock in moisture, is done after the cut, not before: The Styling Cream applied generously, a final pass of the comb, then the braid or twist she leaves with.
The cut on defined curls
This is for the client who wears her hair loose and defined, or who wants a more structured cut. You work on curls that have been defined and then dried with a hairdryer, and the cut is done with the fingers, strand by strand, on hair that already falls the way it will fall at home the next day. The visual check is simple: the strands should fall at the same length before the scissors come anywhere near.
Key point 3Your client's real-life wear decides the hair state
One simple rule settles most cases: you never cut on a hair state your client almost never wears. A straightening done for the occasion gives a perfect line on the day and a wrong cut as soon as the hair returns to its natural state, since it does not spring back to the same length everywhere.
The reverse is just as true, and this is where many salons get it wrong while trying to do the right thing. If your client wears her hair straightened every day, the cut is done on straightened hair. Her real-life wear is what counts, never her texture. So there is no general rule against blow-drying before a cut, and the question to ask fits in one line: how do you wear your hair most of the time?
Two principles round off this conversation. Length remains a decision shared between your client and you, never a technical call made in the chair. And if she is not sure she wants a cut, you do not cut: you show her, you explain shrinkage, you suggest a cutting appointment once you know her hair. To frame this consultation, see our article on the salon hair diagnosis.
Key point 4Section, then check the length
Nothing gets cut until the hair is detangled and under control. Detangling starts with the fingers, on dry hair, before the basin: it is step 01 of the Rituel Texture®, Chadian finger detangling, and it is not skipped on days when you are running late. Our article on detangling a client in the salon details the technique, and the techniques to avoid in the salon go over the habits that get in its way.
Sectioning comes next, and it belongs to the cut as much as to the care: six sections minimum, eight on very dense or very tangled hair, never more than eight. Each section is secured in a loose twist or with a flat clip, and you only work on the one in your hand. On high density, this division is what makes the difference between an even cut and a string of touch-ups your client will feel the next time she styles her hair.
Finally comes the length check, which is the heart of the technique. On dry fibre coated with The Styling Cream, you detangle the ends of the section, check the length against the section already cut, cut, then move on to the next. The final check is done with all the hair released, once the six sections are finished: it is the only moment you see the cut the way your client will see it in her own mirror.
On hair that is already breaking, the cut changes nature: it becomes a clean-up, and the length is decided by the state of the ends rather than by a line drawn in advance. Tell her before you start, or she will count the centimetres instead of looking at what you give back to her.
The tools that make the difference
On coily and very curly textures, long blades win. They go through a wide area in one pass and give a clean line, whereas a short blade multiplies the touch-ups and creates those irregularities you only discover when styling. Texturising scissors are kept for specific cases: on dense fibre, they often create more volume than they remove.
For detangling, The Man Dol' Comb has wider teeth than standard styling combs, to detangle without tearing and to preserve length. It is a tool for detangling and checking, not for tension: as soon as you feel resistance, go back to your fingers and take the strand up again from the bottom.
Explain the cut before you make it
Demonstrating shrinkage takes fifteen seconds and clears up half the misunderstandings. Stretch a strand between thumb and index finger, show the length you get, let go, and let your client see the difference with her own eyes. You can then talk in centimetres without her picturing anything other than what is about to happen.
What disappoints a client
- Cutting on wet hair, then discovering the real line once it dries.
- Cutting on a straightening done for the occasion, which she never wears.
- Working without sections on dense hair.
- Running a comb through dry, bare fibre before the scissors.
- Starting without having shown what shrinkage does.
None of these five points is about cutting technique. They are about preparation, and they are what your client will tell people about.
